Topics - giveme170

If I can only get the RC down, I could get that dream score...but, it just seems impossible for me right now. I keep on missing 2~3 questions per passage. I do read for the structure. Most of the time it seems like I fail to understand the subtle difference between answer choices. Plus, I am slow as a turtle. I can barely finish two passages and if I am really lucky, maybe I can do half of the third passage. Can anyone help? This makes me wanna cry.

It is not correct that the people of the United States, relatively to comparable countries, are the most lightly taxed. True, the United States has the lowest tax, as percent of gross domestic product, of the Western industrialized countries, but tax rates alone do not tell the whole story. People in the United States pay out of pocket for many goods and services provided from tax revenues elsewhere. Consider universal health care, which is an entitlement supported by tax revenues in every other Western industrialized country. United States government health-care expenditures are equivalent to about 5 percent of the gross domestic product, but private health-care expenditures represent another 7 percent. This 7 percent, then, amounts to a tax.

The argument concerning whether the people of the US are most lightly taxed is most vulnerable to which one of the following criticisms?

A) It bases a comparison on percentages rather than on absolute numbers.

B) It unreasonably extends the application of a key term.

E) It sets up a dichotomy between alternatives that are not exclusive.

Could someone break down the argument and explain why each answer choice is right/wrong? I did understand the argument, but do not find a drastic flaw with it. Thanks in advance.

It seems like most people who scored over 170 have studied less than 3 months. Most of these people would get into pretty good law school unless they have a horrible GPA. Would you people say getting into law school is considerably easier than getting into med schools? It seems like many people who scored over 170 (including people I know) did not necessarily study hard to get their score, whereas most of my pre-med friends are spending endless hours in the library to get those A's on their organic chem classes. I myself studied for the LSAT for the past few months and made 15+ points increase on my score, but I am really starting to think all of this is happening way too fast and easy, at least compared to what my premed friends are going through. Is it like getting into law school is much easier than getting into med school? Are med students comparatively more diligent than law students? I am just curious about what you guys think.

Hana said she was not going to invite her brothers to her birthday party. However, among the gifts Hana received at her party was a recording in which she had expressed an interest. Since her brothers had planned to give her that recording, at least some of Hana's brothers must have been among the guests at Hana's Birthday party after all.

Reasoning error in the argument:

B) treats the fact that of someone's presence at a given event as a guarantee that that person had a legitimate reason to be at that event.

D) fails to establish that something true of some people is true of only those people

E) overlooks the possibility that a person's interest in one kind of thing is compatible with that person's interest in a different kind of thing.

Could someone break down the argument and explain what function each part of the argument plays? I think the CR would make much more sense to me if I understood the reasoning structure... Thanks for the help!

I have been taking testmasters course for the past 3 weeks. My scored dropped 7 points on my second diagnostic from what it was on the first one. This made me go hmmm.... Is this because I am only learning the basic approach to each type of questions?

Large-scale government projects designed to benefit everyone- such as roads, schools, and bridges- usually benefit some small segments of society, initially at least, more than others. The more equally and widely political power is distributed among the citizenry, the less likely such projects are to receive funding. Hence, government by referendum rather than by means of elected representatives tends to diminish, not enhance, the welfare of a society.

Which is the assumption?

A) Large-scale government projects sometimes enhance the welfare of society.

E) Government by referendum is the only way to distribute political power equally and widely.

Can someone explain what is going on in this problem? I did not really understand the logical structure of this argument. Thanks in advance.

I almost always miss 1~2 questions per passage on RC. I rarely miss main point/tone questions, but detail/extension questions are giving me trouble because it takes so long for me to choose the right answer (and sometimes i choose the wrong ones). It seems like no matter what I do, I don't seem to improve much on RC. I read the Nova's, the sparknotes, and some of the stuff on here. I found the sparknotes to be pretty helful, but applying everything I learned from it would consume way too much time. Studying for RC is so discouraging because I don't seem to improve at all. Improving on LR was so much easier. Can someone suggest anything that mihgt be helpful? Should I just continue to do passage after passage even though I don't see any improvements? (Yes, that sounded dumb) Please help!

RC is really kicking my behind right now. LR is not all that intimidating anymore since I can pretty much get most of the questions correct if I don't make stupid mistakes. Logic games.... oh well I should review the LGB and start practicing more. I have been doing the RC for the past 2 weeks and I keep missing application questions and some detail questions. The problems I have with these types are:

Application question: When I look back at the passage and start reading the relevant parts, I can't determine if I should read the entire paragraph again or just read few lines regarding the subject. When I do the latter, I always get the question wrong because one part of the answer choice I chose does not match what was said in the passage. Reading the entire paragraph once again seems to be just too much and time consuming.

Detail questions: I cannot distinguish the subtle differences of words used by the answer choices. One answer choice seems to look pretty good, and when I choose it, it is wrong and some other less good looking choice is correct.

I guess I really do not have the basics down for RC. I do enjoy reading RC passages, no problems with that. I also like to summarize and understand the structure and main point. Overall, I really like doing this section. The problem is that I keep missing these types of questions and it is so frustrating because I don't seem to improve. Does anyone have some tips on these types of questions or RC in general? I would really appreciate your help.

Thanks to all the people who helped me with the LR Q's. I feel a lot more comfortabl with many question types now. I am wondering if anyone can give me some tips on RC. I seem to understand the passages pretty well and also understand the structure of them faily well every time I read, but extension questions (the ones author would agree with, or application questions) are giving me hard time because I always pick the second best answer and cannot be sure if my answers are right or wrong. I also have problem with some of the questions that ask me about part of the passage. (ex. Which was not used in the author's attempt to prove his claim) These types of questions tend to be so random that I can barely remember all the things (I do understand the fuction of each passage, but I am not going to remember all the details of them) Could any of you RC gurus help me with these? I would be very thankful.